


When The Game Ends, We'll Sing Again

by clio_jlh



Series: Harvard-Radcliffe 'verse [1]
Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Historical, Bisexual Character, Bisexual Male Character, Cold War, F/M, Fatherhood, Female Character of Color, Female Characters, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Humor, M/M, Male Friendship, Male-Female Friendship, Race, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-12
Updated: 2009-11-12
Packaged: 2017-10-03 23:04:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clio_jlh/pseuds/clio_jlh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Four young men meet as Harvard freshmen in 1959.</p>
            </blockquote>





	When The Game Ends, We'll Sing Again

**Author's Note:**

> A companion fic to [Girls to Talk To](http://archiveofourown.org/works/467322), this time about those Harvard gentlemen. Title from the Harvard fight song, "Ten Thousand Men of Harvard." Ridiculous pile of cultural influences listed at the end.  
> Thanks to [](http://rawles.livejournal.com/profile)[**rawles**](http://rawles.livejournal.com/) and [](http://ali-wildgoose.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://ali-wildgoose.livejournal.com/)**ali_wildgoose** for their help and encouragement on this story; all errors are my own. Thanks also to the ol' alma mater; I hope I've done you proud.

**the longest day**

 

_September, 1959_

When Leonard McCoy walked into Harvard Yard for the first time he was actually a little embarrassed. He was eighteen years old, a goddamned _adult_, and he didn't need his parents accompanying him on the train from Atlanta to Boston. He could move his own self into college, thanks. Enthusiastic young men with sweaters that said "Crimson Key" were handing out maps and giving directions; McCoy wondered if their school spirit would calm his parents, show them that maybe this Yankee school wasn't so different from their beloved University of Georgia.

"Hello!" said one of them, and as if God Himself were looking after McCoy, the fellow had a southern accent. "Where y'all headed?"

McCoy looked down at the letter he'd received over the summer. "Holworthy 13," he replied.

"Great!" the man said. "Just over there on the end—" he pointed to a squat brick building— "and you want the middle stairwell, third floor." He handed him a map and some kind of schedule that said "Freshman Week" at the top. "Here's the events," he said, "and you should come to as many as you can, to meet your fellow classmates and learn about Harvard!"

As they walked away his mother wrapped her arm around his waist. "Well, if you can meet nice young men like that," she said, "maybe it will work out."

McCoy didn't trust himself to reply.

When they got to the third floor, he pushed the door open cautiously. "Hello?" he called out. The room itself was nice, with big windows and a large common area with desks. There were two bedrooms at the other end, with bunkbeds, and a door led to a back hallway and, McCoy assumed, the bathroom.

McCoy heard a voice say "ooh!" and then a boy—no, man; if McCoy was calling himself a man then his roommates were surely men as well—emerged from one of the bedrooms, talking very fast in a thick brogue he could only just understand. "Hello, hello," he said, grinning. "Name's Montgomery Scott, easy to remember as I'm from Scotland. Scott the Scot, yeah? Are you Kirk?"

"No," his father said, "we're McCoys! This is my son Leonard."

"Hello Leonard," Scott said, shaking his hand. "We have—oh here he is."

Another man emerged from one of the doors at the back of the room. He had dark hair and an impassive face. "Hello," he said. "I'm Spock."

"McCoy," he replied, shaking his hand as well.

"Spock's from New York City," Scott said.

"How about that," the elder McCoy said.

"Spock?" his mother said. "And what kind of name is that?"

Spock cocked his head. "American," he said gravely, and McCoy didn't dare make eye contact lest he burst out laughing.

Scott spoke then. "We know our last one's named Kirk, because his trunk is here. Though we haven't seen _him_ yet."

As if on cue, another fellow came in the door behind them. Unlike Spock and Scott, who were in sport coats and oxford shirts, or McCoy who still wore his jacket and tie from the train, this man wore blue jeans rolled up at the ankle, a white t-shirt, and a brown leather bomber jacket. He had a rucksack slung over one shoulder.

McCoy was unsurprised to see his father cast him a disapproving look. "Can I help you, son?" he asked.

The fellow took off his sunglasses and looked right at McCoy, eyes as blue as Paul Newman's, and McCoy's breath caught a little in the back of his throat. "Is this Holworthy 13?" he asked.

"Yes," Spock said.

He grinned. "Then I live here." He reached across to shake McCoy's hand. "James Tiberius Kirk."

"Leonard Horatio McCoy," he said, surprising himself as he rarely revealed his middle name to anyone.

"Grandfather?" Kirk asked.

"Great-grandfather," McCoy replied.

Scott and Spock introduced themselves, and the elder McCoys were hustled out fairly quickly after that.

"Sorry about that," he said, allowing the natural irritable edge to seep back into voice now that they were gone. "Mother insisted on taking the train up from Atlanta. She wanted to make sure my roommates were the right 'sort' because those Yankee schools let in just anyone."

"Right sort?" Scott asked.

"Yeah, you know, not a Jew, probably not a Catholic, and certainly not a Negro." He paused. "No offense, Spock."

"None taken," Spock replied. "I am Jewish, as your mother suspected. I hope I was not disrespectful in my answer to her."

"Not a bit," McCoy replied. "It was her _question_ that was rude."

Spock almost smiled at this.

"Hell," McCoy went on, "if I'd wanted to be surrounded by white Protestants bemoaning the 'situation' in Little Rock I'd've gone to Ole Miss with Jocelyn."

"Jocelyn?" Kirk asked.

McCoy smiled. "Yeah, she's my fiancee. Or I should say, we have an _understandin'_."

"Huh," Scott said, looking surprised, and McCoy wondered if maybe being young and engaged wasn't as common in Scotland as it was in Georgia. "Well, I'm all for that. Less competition for the girls."

Kirk grinned at that. "Well I don't know about you, but I'm starving. I've been in town a few days, and there's a chop suey joint around the corner. Sound good?"

And so over egg rolls and sweet and sour pork they told stories—well, what stories they had to tell at eighteen. Scott planned to study aeronautical engineering, and when the others asked why he wasn't at MIT, told the whole story about the MIT Summer program, an experimental light aircraft, and that Scottish terrier that unfortunately belonged to the Dean of Students. "But we did find him eventually. The dog, I mean."

"When and where?" McCoy asked.

"The end of August, at the Paul Revere House. It was the darnedest thing." He shrugged. "Must have put the decimal in the wrong place."

Spock was the son of a Columbia professor and was trying to decide between philosophy and physics.

"Maybe you should study the philosophy of physics," Kirk suggested.

"Or the physics of philosophy," McCoy added.

"Wouldn't that be metaphysics?" Scott asked, making everyone groan.

Kirk's bomber jacket had belonged to his father, who'd died in the war. He'd grown up on a farm in Iowa and was interested in Soviet studies. "Know thy enemy, right?"

"Surely you did not travel from Iowa to Massachusetts dressed in denims," Spock said.

"Well, I thought I'd take the summer to see the country a bit, as I've only left Iowa once before and that was to go to Missouri. But my resources are limited, so I shipped the trunk and hitched my way here." Kirk shrugged. "Regular folks won't pick up a hitch in a coat and tie. What's he need a ride for?"

"Fair point," Spock conceded.

"Anyway, the plan right now is to join up with the air force once I graduate. Be a flyboy like my dad was. Travel, adventure, shoot the bad guys—just like the movies."

McCoy was a medical school-bound biology concentrator who planned to marry his high school sweetheart. "And then I'll go home, be a country doctor like my grandfather."

"A Harvard-educated country doctor?" Kirk asked.

"What's wrong with that?" McCoy asked, frowning.

"Not a thing," Kirk said, holding up his hands. "It's just unusual, is all."

"Well I'm not a usual sort of fellow," McCoy said, taking a drink.

"Good," Kirk said.

"Funny," McCoy went on. "None of you have asked me why I came up here, why I left the South."

Scott shrugged. "I reckoned it was the same reason Kirk left the farm and I left the UK and Spock isn't at his dad's school. Get away from all those people we've known since we were just wee ones."

"Who think they know us, but they don't," Kirk said, crunching into a crab rangoon.

"Who think they know better than we do what is best for us," Spock added, nodding solemnly.

McCoy blinked. "Yeah, I reckon it is the same reason," he said. "Well, then here's to running our own lives for once."

"Aye to that," Scott said as they clinked glasses.

Kirk looked around the table, a gleam in his eye. "The four of us, we're kinda like a squadron, come to think of it," he said.

"I think you've seen too many war movies," McCoy replied, rolling his eyes.

"No, I'm serious!" he protested. "A southerner, a midwestern farm boy, a New York Jew—though to be honest, Spock, they're usually scrappy little guys from Brooklyn."

"I have won a fist fight or two," Spock said somberly.

"I'll take your word on that," Kirk replied.

"And who am I?" Scott asked.

"I dunno," Kirk said, squinting. "You were on the right side of the fight—"

"Right side?" Scott replied. "That fight was in my bloody back garden thank you very much."

"Are you Catholic?" McCoy asked. "One of them's always a Catholic."

"Me dad was, before he married Mum," he said, shrugging. "I can pretend."

"Anyway," Kirk went on, "since we're going to, what did the acceptance letter say? 'Embark on the grand enterprise of higher education.'" He grinned and they all started cracking up. "We should have _nicknames_!"

"Like what?" McCoy asked.

"Well, Scott is clearly Scotty," Kirk said.

"Because of my name? Because I'm from Scotland?" he asked.

"No, brother," Kirk replied. "Because of the _dog_."

"Ha ha," Scotty replied.

"And McCoy here's gonna be a doc," Kirk went on, "and docs are _always_ 'Sawbones', though that's kind of—"

"Barbaric?" McCoy said.

"So we'll just call you Bones. Besides, you have good ones."

"Thanks?" McCoy said.

"Don't mention it. And Spock, well." Kirk paused. "Gotta tell you, brother, you've got this unpronounceable first name."

"It's Hebrew," Spock said.

"Unpronounceable in mixed company at least. And do you ever laugh?"

"On occasion."

"Well, Spock it is, then. Or Mr. Spock, even better."

Spock cocked his head. "That would be acceptable."

"What about you, Kirk?" McCoy asked.

"Oh, I'm just Jim," he replied. "The last girl I dated did call me James Tiberius Asshole, but I don't really answer to that."

* * *

The four roommates went to the freshman mixer that evening with all the best intentions. They circulated through the crowd as a unit, talking to their new classmates in the semi-darkness of the Yard. But less than an hour later Kirk was restless.

"What's the point if there aren't any girls here?" he asked.

"I believe we are to network within our class," Spock said. "Sow the seeds for relationships that may help us in the future."

"Yeah, well, nuts to that," Jim replied.

"If what you're wantin' are girls," Scott said.

They all leaned in with interest.

"There's a certain ladies' college not far up the road havin' their own mixer this very minute," he finished, smiling smugly.

Jim grinned. "Scotty, I like the way you think. Well, men, dare we breach the protected inner sanctum of the Radcliffe Yard?"

McCoy shrugged. "Why not?"

"Spock?" Jim asked.

Spock was expressionless, though it would have been difficult to read anyone's face in the dim light of the Yard. "I suppose I should accompany you, if only to avoid any kind of incident for which we might be disciplined."

"Incident?" Jim asked, all innocence. "What makes you think that?"

Spock raised one eyebrow. "You make a very strong impression, Jim."

Scotty was right—their sister college was having a mixer in their own Yard, only a few minutes' walk down the street. The ladies of Radcliffe—or, as their fellow Harvard men called them, the "Cliffies"—were only separated for housing and a few libraries; the classes had long since become entirely co-ed. Kirk said he doubted that they'd be the first Harvard men to crash the Cliffies' party, but it seemed at a glance that they were.

The first one to spot them as they wandered in through the gate was a tall, slim Negro girl with the bearing of a dancer, standing next to another girl with long curly red hair. She cocked her head and crossed her arms. "And what are you gentlemen doing here?" she asked.

Kirk smiled. "It's a mixer," he said. "We came to mix."

She rolled her eyes.

He extended his hand. "I'm James T. Kirk. And you are?"

She shook it reluctantly. "Miss Uhura," she replied.

"No first name?" he asked.

"Not for you," she replied.

"My name is Gaila!" announced the redhead, bouncing a little as she shook Jim's hand. "I'm her roommate."

"Well, Gaila, Miss Uhura, it's very nice to meet you both. May I introduce Scott—we call him Scotty, Bones McCoy, and Mr. Spock. Say, Spock, you can converse with Miss Uhura on the freedom of lacking a first name." He nudged Spock ever so slightly in Miss Uhura's direction. "While I talk a bit more with the lovely Gaila. Do you happen to have a last name, or is your room just for women with one name?"

Gaila giggled, and McCoy could see in a flash the next four years of Jim Kirk charming his way around Cambridge and shuddered. "You know that nice grey stone lecture hall in Harvard Yard?" she asked

"Yeah," Kirk replied. "I think I'm going to have a history class there. Why?"

She leaned forward, forcing Scott, McCoy and Kirk to lean toward her. "_That's_ my last name," she whispered.

McCoy was startled—the building was named for a very old, very wealthy, very well-connected California family. Gaila was just the sort of person his mother would have wanted him to meet, and stubbornly McCoy almost didn't want to talk to her.

Kirk, of course, had a different reaction. "Does that make you a madcap heiress?" Kirk asked. "Because one of the things I wanted to do when I got to Harvard was meet a madcap heiress." He smiled.

"Not yet but maybe I should be!" She giggled again, then turned to the two blondes standing nearby. "These are our other roommates, Christine Chapel and Janice Rand."

"Hello," Janice said, shaking their hands.

"Janice is an _artist_," Gaila said.

Janice blushed prettily. "Gaila, I'm merely a serviceable painter!" she protested.

McCoy could see that the handsome Kirk had caught her eye, but Scotty was apparently undeterred. "I'm sure I'd love to see your work," Scott said, laying the accent on just a _little_ thicker, and was rewarded with a smile from the girl.

Gaila pulled the other blonde, who seemed a shade hesitant, a bit closer. "And Christine is going to be a doctor."

"Is that so?" McCoy said, perking up and taking a step further into the circle. "So am I."

"I should warn you," Christine said, lifting up her left hand, "that I'm engaged to be married."

McCoy took yet another step toward her. "Well," he said, smiling, "so am I."

"Oh!" Christine said, surprised, and McCoy could see her shoulders relax.

"Bones's excuse is that he met his girl when he was a toddler or something, but how did a young girl like yourself get taken so quickly?" Kirk asked.

"He was teaching at a summer program I attended, at Bryn Mawr," she replied. "He's a medical archeologist, finishing his PhD at Penn."

"Well," Scott said, "clearly us mere mortals cannot compete with _that_."

"Oh _honestly_," Miss Uhura said, looking at the gate beyond them.

McCoy turned to see that while they may have been the first Harvard men to get the bright idea to crash the Radcliffe mixer, they were far from the last.

An enthusiastic looking girl with a Crimson Key sweater on walked by. "Oh don't worry, ladies!" she called out. "It's a tradition for the boys to crash our party eventually!"

The other ladies seemed enthusiastic about this turn of events, but Miss Uhura just shook her head.

Kirk grinned. "_Apres moi, le deluge_."

* * *

"I feel like we've moved beyond having a sister college," Scotty said, "to having a sister _room_." They were back in their room, after spending about an hour chatting with Gaila and her three roommates. McCoy had stuck close to Miss Chapel—Christine, she insisted he call her—and was looking forward to seeing her again. She was intelligent and interesting, as excited about medicine as he was, and with both of them engaged there was no danger of misunderstandings. He was sure Jocelyn would be glad to hear he'd made such a friend.

"Man, that means I'm never going to get rid of that girl," Kirk said.

"Janice?" McCoy asked. "She didn't seem very serious."

"No, no, Miss Uhura, and I don't mean romantically." He sighed. "She's taking Russian! With my luck she'll be in my class."

"I found Miss Uhura to be a delightful conversationalist," Spock said. "She's well-traveled, speaks several languages, and is planning to concentrate in linguistics."

Kirk slumped onto his desk and sighed. "Well, you can have her, brother."

Scotty was rubbing his hands together. "Don't worry about that, lads," he said. "There's more than just those Cliffies, lovely as they were."

"Oh?" McCoy asked.

"Yeah, at the weekend buses come in from the other ladies' colleges. Smith, Wellesley, Holyoke. We'll be drowning in girls." He smiled.

Kirk perked up. "I like the sound of that," he said.

"Gentlemen," Spock said, "we _are_ here to earn a degree."

Kirk waved his hand. "Libraries are for the weekdays, Spock," he said.

"You know," McCoy said, "the college seal originally had that one book face down for all the things we should be learning that _aren't_ in books."

"I am sure that the designers of the seal did not intend for you to seek that one-third of your knowledge solely in the arms of women," Spock replied.

Kirk shrugged. "You find it your way, I'll find it mine."

* * *

**everybody comes to rick's**

 

_February, 1963_

After five straight hours in the bowels of Widener library reading Russian primary sources from 1917, Jim Kirk had had _enough_ of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin and his pointy beard and bald head. What was to be done, obviously, was to head back to the suite in Lowell House and bother his roommates. Over the past three-and-a-half years Jim had refined his techniques for getting a rise out of them. Scotty was easy, but not as satisfying because you didn't have to work for it; he flared up but then calmed back down pretty quickly. Spock took _forever_ to react; it was like water dripping on a rock. That was more about constant effort for an occasional result. But Bones gave the best effort-to-satisfaction ratio, and luckily he was home, working in his room with the door open. "Bones!"

Bones didn't even look up. "What do you want, Jim?" he asked, sounding a little tired.

"Whatcha workin' on?" Jim asked, turning his head to try to read upside down.

"Lab report," he replied. Bones's senior thesis was on an alternate method of virus cultivation, which Jim thought was pretty cool.

He slouched down in the chair next to Bones's desk. "How's that going?"

"Pretty well, actually," McCoy replied.

"I figured," Jim said. "You've got the bedside manner of a born researcher."

McCoy scowled. "I hope that wasn't intended as a compliment."

"Of course it was," Jim said. "So since it's going well …"

"Yes, Jim, I'll be done by spring break," he replied, answering the question Jim had been asking him since the term began.

"Great!" Jim said. "Where should we go?"

Spring break had been a bit of a problem since Spock and Nyota started dating freshman year. All those "Where the Boys Are" beaches were in the south, so they couldn't go as a group to any of them—and with folks pouring acid on the Negroes trying to integrate the pools in St. Augustine, Bones wasn't inclined to take any chances. Besides, they'd all seen how Spock reacted to relatively mild race feelings—even in Boston, a mixed race couple attracted attention—and while Nyota knew how to play the game, Spock did _not_. A quietly agitated Spock who might explode at any moment was something none of them wanted to deal with, especially Nyota.

"'Back to the mountains?" Bones asked. "Do some hiking, maybe some camping?"

"I could stand a break from the city," Jim admitted. "Hell, I could just stand a break from Lenin."

"We could _all_ stand a break from Lenin," Bones said. "And virus cultivation, and how to make a faster turbine engine, and the philosophical implications of quantum physics."

Scotty poked his head in the door then, munching on a sandwich.

"Oh you're up," Jim said. Scotty had turned almost entirely nocturnal while working on his thesis. "We're talking about spring break."

"Can we talk over dinner?" Scotty asked.

"Scotty, you're eating _right now_," Bones said.

"This?" he asked. "This is just a snack."

"Well," Bones said, "seeing as it's six, we may as well go down to the dining hall. Though I'd love to know where the day has gone. Where's Spock?"

"He said he was taking Nyota to dinner tonight," Scotty said.

The door of the common room opened and closed.

"Or not," Jim said.

Spock walked by Bones's door. "Gentlemen," he said, nodding slightly, before going into his bedroom and shutting the door.

The three looked at each other, then Jim and Bones scrambled to their feet.

"Spock?" Jim called, knocking on his door. There was a muffled mumble from inside and Jim opened the door slowly.

Spock was sitting on the window seat. Light spilled into the darkened room from the street lamp outside. "You should go to dinner," he said, looking out the window. "I am going to meditate."

The others walked further into the room. "Spock?" Jim asked again.

He turned slightly, looking at the floor. "We—Miss—Nyota and I are no longer dating."

"What?" Jim asked. "How?"

"I suppose I will have to tell you," he said, and paused, shifting in the seat and leaning his back against the window. The others sat down—Scotty in Spock's desk chair, Jim and Bones on the bed. "We were walking back to her rooms from the library, and I mentioned the possibility of attending the same school for our graduate studies, as both of our departments have expressed an interest in our continuing our studies here at Harvard. She replied that with our undergraduate years coming to a close, it was time to be practical."

"What's impractical about staying at Harvard?" Jim asked.

Spock shrugged. "Nyota explained that we could not possibly be married, not only due to the obvious racial difference but also the significant religious one, and noted that our marriage would be illegal in several states."

Jim looked down and noticed that Bones's hands had curled into fists as Spock talked and he reached out, rubbing the top of one of them to relax it.

Spock went on, "She then stated that she felt a duty to give more than simply her summers to the movement, and that marrying a colored man was expected of her."

"'What did you say?" Scotty asked.

Spock shook his head. "I had no argument to make. Everything she said was perfectly logical. We agreed that as our relationship, however satisfying and mutually beneficial, has no future, we should end it before it becomes serious."

"_Becomes_ serious?" Bones asked. "I'm sorry, Spock. But it must hurt."

Spock shrugged. "What is that saying, from the film Jim admires? 'The problems of two little people …'"

"'Don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world,'" Jim finished softly.

"So there you are," Spock said.

"I'll tell ya one thing," Scotty said. "There's no bloody way you're sitting in here meditating tonight."

Trust Scotty to get to the heart of the matter. "Scotty's right," Jim said. "We're taking you out and getting you drunk."

Spock raised an eyebrow. "I do not think—"

"Exactly," Bones interrupted. "You gotta stop thinking."

Spock sighed.

"Come _on_, Spock," Jim said. "I'm the only one with a class tomorrow, and I doubt I'd go to it anyway." What he didn't say—what they all knew—was that Jim's Friday class was fourth-year Russian and that Nyota was one of his classmates.

"If you insist," Spock said.

"We do," Jim replied.

Spock looked out the window. "Very well."

"Brilliant!" Scotty said.

"All right, men," Jim said, feeling just a little better for the activity. "Denims and tennis shoes. I know the perfect place, this dive in Somerville full of old men drinking cheap whiskey. There's sawdust on the floor and free hot dogs for dinner."

"Sounds like my kinda place," Bones said, rolling his eyes.

"Of course it is, Bones," Jim replied, slapping him on the back. "I've seen the way you can put away bourbon when you're in a snit, and you've probably been an old man since you were ten. Since before we met, anyway."

"Well _thanks_," he replied.

"'Don't mention it. S'why we keep you around."

* * *

_March, 1963_

The spring break plan had been made that very night, before they were too far gone. By the break they had handed in their theses, gotten acceptance letters from graduate schools, and were headed into a period of comparative freedom after four years of hard work. The McCoys had a house near Myrtle Beach, so the boys packed up the little car they'd gone in on a few years before and drove south for a week of sun and fun. There'd been a cloud over the whole room in the five weeks since Spock and Nyota broke up, and getting out of Cambridge felt very necessary.

They'd been in Carolina for a few days, going to the beach in the day and various dances at night. Bones was painstakingly teaching Spock how to do the shag so he might stop stepping on girls' toes. On this night there'd been a bonfire just down the beach from their house and as usual someone had a guitar. The singing started out with old camp songs and then moved on to pop, which was a little better for Jim's objective of necking with the pretty blonde he'd met that afternoon.

Then he sensed movement out of the corner of his eye and realized that Bones had gone. Looking up, he saw him walking down the beach. Jim glanced at Scotty and Spock and nodded his head, then made his apologies to Gerta—God, he hoped her name was Gerta—and trotted off to follow Bones. His friend had been a little down himself the past few weeks, partially because the break-up meant that his buddy-in-engagement-and-medicine Christine had been pretty scarce, and partially because Jocelyn was giving him a hard time about wanting to pursue an MD/PhD so he could keep doing research. Jim frankly didn't trust him to be alone in a house full of bourbon when he was in that kind of mood.

"Hey! Bones, wait up!"

He turned to Jim.

"Where're you headed?" Jim asked.

"Back to the house. It was starting to feel a little too _Gidget Goes Hawaiian_ for me. But what about that blonde?" he asked, bumping shoulders with Jim. "You worked awfully hard to get her."

Jim shrugged. "She'll be around tomorrow, thinking what a loyal friend I am, or she won't, in which case it doesn't matter. Besides, plenty of time to chase girls. I only have you fellas around for two more months."

Bones shook his head. "There's always Europe."

"True, but it's not the same and not all of us." After commencement the four boys were headed to Scotty's home in Aberdeen for a week before going their separate ways. Scotty and Spock had other obligations, but Jim and Bones were going to travel for a couple of months, bumming around on their savings and McCoy's 21st birthday money, keeping Bones out of the way of the wedding planning in Atlanta. He was to be married in early September, and then he was off to med school, Jim to the Air Force. Jim hadn't wanted Bones to spend the money on him, but Bones had insisted that Jim would pay for himself with his know-how on hitchhiking and cheap hotels.

"It's not all of us right now," Bones said.

"Yeah." Jim turned, walking backwards. "Beautiful night. Wanna bring the whiskey out onto the porch?"

"No thanks," he said.

"What?" Jim asked. "No class, no work, away on vacation, and Leonard McCoy doesn't want to drink?"

He shrugged. "You said it, Jim. It _is_ a beautiful night. I'd like to remember it clearly."

They still ended up on the porch, but with two glasses of chocolate milk, something Jim hadn't had since he was a kid, and he felt pretty cozy sitting there with Bones.

Jim looked up at the full moon shining on the ocean. "Think we'll get there?" he asked.

"Kennedy says we will," Bones replied. "That what you'll go for in the Air Force?"

"Nah," Jim said. "It's not like Buck Rogers. They're just sittin' on top of rockets. I wanna _fly_."

"Well, I hope that the Air Force is smart enough to have you do more than flying."

Jim scowled a little. "Like what?"

Bones shook his head. "I've never known anyone who could come near you in terms of talkin' folks into stuff they didn't wanna do. Gaila and Jan are still talking to you even though you dated both of them at the same time. The Soviet Studies people think the sun shines out of your ass. Hell, you've not only charmed my own mother into liking you—and you two had a _rough_ meeting—but you charmed her into liking _Spock_. If the government is smart, which ain't often, they'll figure out how to harness that. They put you in Moscow, you'll keep Khrushchev so entertained he'll forget to declare World War Three."

Jim laughed at that, though he was gratified to hear Bones's faith in him. "Yeah, maybe, I dunno. Sounds too much like a desk job," he said. "But if I'm so damned persuasive how come I can't get you to accept one of the MD/PhD programs?"

"Because I am singularly immune to your charm," Bones replied. "That's why you like me."

"No you're not, and no it isn't. C'mon, Bones, if you won't listen to me at least listen to Spock. He's been telling you it's the only logical choice since the acceptance letters started rolling in."

"It's complicated, Jim. Jocelyn—"

"Jocelyn!" Jim sighed. "Let me tell you something. I like Jocelyn—"

"No you don't."

"Yes, I do," Jim insisted. "She's a nice girl, she seems to really be into you, she's loyal enough not to flirt with me—"

"You're not her type. She doesn't like dangerous; she likes reliable."

"That's the whole problem, Bones. She wants a nice doctor husband who makes a good living and drives a Buick and plays golf every Saturday afternoon with the local judge at one of those country clubs that wouldn't let Spock become a member. You don't even _like_ golf." It broke Jim's heart a little, to think of Bones going back to that life. He'd visited Bones in Georgia one summer, and the whole unholy mess of it made him tense the entire week. Only late at night when they lay in his twin beds, talking, did Bones seem like the man he was every day in Cambridge.

"Well," he said, "maybe there's a little more wiggle room than that."

"I hope so," Jim said. "Just tell me you're really thinking about it."

"Jim, if I weren't seriously considering it, I never would have applied to the programs," he said. "Just, you gotta let me think it over."

"Okay." He held up his half-full glass. "Here's to our future. Our great big American future." He and Bones clinked glasses, and they both drank down the rest of their chocolate milk.

Jim felt a little odd—maybe it was the moon, or the little-kid-ness of chocolate milk, or all the sun he'd had that week. But for whatever reason tonight everything felt open and possible.

"Thinking great thoughts over there?" Bones asked.

"Not really," Jim said, looking over at his friend, who was staring down at his empty glass, a little smile on his face.

Suddenly he looked up, and met Jim's gaze. "What?" he asked, self-conscious.

"Nothing," Jim said quickly, and felt himself flush. "You have a mustache. From the milk." He put his hand on Bones's cheek, and he really meant to just wipe it off the mustache with his thumb, but Bones's eyes were so big and dark in the moonlight that he couldn't look away.

"I—" McCoy began, but Jim leaned in and kissed him, surprising even himself.

It should have felt sudden, unexpected, unnatural, but it was none of those things. It was more like they'd been headed to this place since the day they met.

They pulled apart, breathless, even though it was just one kiss. Jim swallowed, and felt suddenly shy. "I …" His eyes dropped.

Bones smiled, and while Jim knew he was a lucky person, he couldn't believe he was _this_ lucky. "Let's go upstairs," he said.

They took care to shut Jim's door before running into Bones's room, Jim kicking the door shut behind them as Bones kissed him, pushing him back against the door. "Damn," he said, "why didn't I know this before?"

"I didn't even know," Jim said, "until ten minutes ago." He was unbuttoning Bones's shirt and mentally cursing undershirts, and belts, and shoes, and everything that stood between them and being naked in that bed _right now_.

Bones seemed to read his mind. "Slow down, cowboy," Bones said. He pulled back and shucked his shirt and undershirt, then helped Jim do the same. Nothing they hadn't seen before—heck, nothing they hadn't seen on the beach earlier that very day, but bodies looked different in bedrooms.

Jim had got his tennis shoes off, as had Bones, and he grabbed Bones's belt, pulling him forward. "I don't do anything slow. You know that," Jim said, before kissing him again as he undid his belt and shorts and pushed boxers and all off his hips.

"Well, I do," Bones said firmly, pushing Jim back into the door. He was as good as his word, too, taking his own sweet time getting Jim undressed, and Jim just stood and watched him, getting his fill now that he could stare all he wanted. Bones, of course, wasn't having it. "What are you looking at?" he asked, frowning a little.

"You," Jim said.

"Well—"

"Well nothing," Jim interrupted, wrapping a hand around the back of Bones's neck. "You look at me all the damn time, when you think I'm not looking."

Bones kept his eyes down. "Everyone looks at you, Jim."

"Yeah, well, I look at _you_." Jim said, and waited for Bones to look him in the eye again. "Okay?"

"Okay," Bones said.

Jim wasn't sure how they made it to the bed, but they did, and they were naked, and it was pretty great with hands just _everywhere_ and now he understood what girls meant when they said guys were like octopi. He wanted to feel everything, feel how different it was, what pleased Bones and what didn't, and it was all kind of weird and overwhelming and his brain was flying around scattershot until Bones wrapped a hand around his cock and everything slammed into focus. Then it was just his hand, and Jim's hand on Bones's cock, and his eyes so blown out you could just barely see the green of them, and his mouth set in that tiny frown of concentration that Jim just had to kiss because it was so fucking sexy. And really who were they kidding—they were twenty-one, they were eager, there was no reason to last all that long, and they didn't, coming pretty quickly one right after the other. It was like a tornado, sweeping in and blowing everything around before vanishing.

They lay there for a while in the afterglow, getting their breath back, their limbs entangled in the sheets.

Of course at some point Bones had to say something. "Jim, I—"

"No," Jim said. "Don't say it. We both know it."

"Yeah," Bones said, sitting up and putting his head in his hands. "Yeah."

Jim sat up at that, because Bones sounded almost despondent. "Hey, it's not that bad," he said, rubbing Bones's back.

"Oh really?" he asked, lifting his head up to face Jim. "Enlighten me. Because dammit Jim, I—"

"I know, Bones," Jim said. "I do, too. And we can't—I know we can't. You want to be a doctor, I'm going into the air force, we can't. But that doesn't matter."

"Doesn't _matter_?" Bones asked, and his eyebrows were threatening to leap off his face altogether.

Jim shook his head. He didn't know how but he could see it all, at a glance, how it all fit together. "Even if we never touch each other again—well, after the trip, because brother we are fucking our way across Europe and I don't mean maybe—I've still got you. I can find someone else to suck my dick. But I can't find someone else to be _you_, and that isn't going anyplace. Right?"

"Right," Bones answered, and he was quiet, staring at Jim.

Jim slid his hand around to wrap around Bones's shoulder, and after a few minutes Bones leaned into him, resting his head on Jim's shoulder. They sat that way for a while, just breathing, until Bones spoke again.

"Fucking our way across Europe, huh?"

"You bet."

"We'll always have Paris?"

Jim nodded. "Something like that."

He lifted his head and smiled, that rarest of expressions, and Jim had gotten two that very night. "Come here," he said, pulling Jim into a kiss.

"Bones," Jim muttered, still kissing him, "I think this is the beginning of—"

"Don't you say it," Bones replied, kissing him harder so he'd stop talking already.

Jim wrapped his other arm around Bones, pulling him down onto the bed, and they started their European trip a little early.

* * *

Jim went back to his room after they heard the others come back, so he wouldn't be caught in the hallway. Not that all of them hadn't fallen asleep in each other's rooms on occasion at school, when they were up too late talking and crashed, but still. When he woke up in the morning, he thought about what Bones had said the night before, about wanting to be able to remember it. Jim felt like every second of it was etched on his skin, and he'd probably need a lot of help from somewhere to keep it from Scotty and Spock's sharp eyes.

He took a shower, threw on boxers and an undershirt and trudged downstairs to see Scotty sitting at the kitchen table, Bones standing near the stove. "Is that coffee I smell?" he asked. "I hope you made it, Bones." Scotty made amazing cocktails but truly terrible coffee.

"Yep, it'll be ready in a minute," McCoy said. He was dressed and looked like he'd been out on the beach already, and there was a sheen of sweat on his skin.

Jim didn't look for fear of staring, instead slumping down into the chair opposite Scotty, who wasn't dressed yet either. "Have a good night, Scotty?" Jim asked.

"I did. You?"

"I did. Bones is a great kisser. Get a glass of chocolate milk into him and he's yours for the night." Jim winked.

"Ha ha," Bones said, rolling his eyes.

"Wish I'd known that sooner," Scotty said, grinning.

"Coffee's ready," Bones said, and Scotty grabbed mugs and milk and put them on the table. "Where's Spock?"

"He got into the shower after me," Jim said. "Must be done now."

"Well, I'm going to take a shower, and then I've got something to say."

Scotty raised his eyebrows and looked at Jim, who shrugged. When looked up Bones shook his head just the tiniest bit and Jim breathed again.

"You two could make yourselves useful," Bones went on. "There's bacon and eggs in the fridge."

"Okay, Bones," Jim said, and Bones went upstairs. "What was that all about?" Jim asked.

"Dunno," Scotty replied. "He said he went for a run on the beach this morning because he needed to think. What did you two talk about last night anyway?"

Jim got up and started rooting through the cupboards, finding the mixing bowl and measuring cups and spoons. "Oh, you know, he was melancholy. He gets that way."

Scotty cocked his head. "Actually most of the time he's choleric."

"Yeah, well, not lately," Jim said, scooping flour into the bowl. "And yeah, so I pushed him a little on the school thing."

"Jim," Scotty said, shaking his head. "A man's gotta make his own way."

"I know, it's just—"

"I mean it," Scotty said sternly, and Jim turned to him, startled, because Scotty was rarely this firm about anything other than his engines. "He has to make that decision for himself. You cannot lead him there. It won't be fair to either of you in the long run."

Jim sighed. "Yeah," he said. "I just hope—"

"And you have to support him no matter what he decides," Scotty said.

Jim scowled, banging on the counter with a measuring spoon. "You're right. I know you're right," he said. "Can you hand me the eggs and milk from the fridge?"

"What are you making?" Scotty asked.

"Pancakes," Jim replied. He turned on the flame under the griddle at the center of the stove.

Spock walked into the kitchen then, grabbing himself a cup of coffee.

"Who knew Jim Kirk could make pancakes from scratch?" Scotty asked.

"Of course he can," Spock said. "He is from the west."

"Iowa isn't exactly the west, Spock," Jim replied, cracking an egg into the bowl.

"It is west of the Hudson," Spock said.

Jim rolled his eyes. "Is one of you going to make the bacon?" he asked.

By the time Bones came back downstairs Jim had gone through most of the batter. "Useful enough for you, Bones?" Jim asked. "There's more keeping warm in the oven, and bacon too, and we heated the syrup."

"You waited for me?" Bones asked.

Jim shrugged. "Seemed polite." He put the last two on the plate, buttered them, and slid the plate into the oven. He flicked the stove off and turned around, leaning against the counter. "So, you have something to say?" he asked, feeling a little nervous in spite of himself.

"Sit down, Jim," Bones said. He pushed his chair into the table, leaned forward against the back of it, took a deep breath, and looked dead at Spock, opposite him.

"When Nyota broke up with you, you said you didn't have any logical arguments to use against hers. You accepted it, so we accepted it. But we were all wrong."

Jim looked over at Scotty, but he looked as surprised as Jim felt.

"I've been thinking a lot about this, last night and this morning," Bones went on. "Hell, these past few years we've known each other. And the thing is, there ain't nothing _rational_ about love. You don't have any arguments against hers because there aren't any—she's right. But we don't get a lot of love in our lives, and it seems to me that when we _do_ get it, however we get it, we should grab onto it with both hands. You don't just give up; you fight."

Jim looked up at Bones, wondering where he fit into this theory about love, but Bones wasn't looking at him.

Bones was still talking. "We all know that the two of you together is gonna be tough. Maybe you just need to show her that you're willing to fight for it alongside her, that it wouldn't just be her fight. Because Spock, I've known you for almost four years now, and I've never seen you walk away from a fight. You're as bad as Jim. So why are you walking away from this one?"

They all looked at Spock, but he said nothing, though the grip on his coffee cup seemed a bit tighter than usual.

Bones pulled out his chair and sat down. "Guess I'll take those pancakes now, Jim."

In the stunned silence, Jim got up and started fixing plates of pancakes and bacon and Scotty poured the heated syrup into a gravy boat and passed it around.

Spock had been staring down at the table, but finally he looked up. "So you suggest that I talk to her after we return from spring break?" he asked.

"Hell no," Bones replied. "I'm suggesting we eat breakfast, pack the car, and take you to Nyota today."

"Today?" Spock asked. "But we do not know—"

"She's in the Poconos," Scotty said, "at the Chapels' cottage." The eight of them had spent previous breaks at the vacation home, so the boys knew it well.

"I see," Spock said. "You do make a good deal of sense."

"Of course I do," Bones replied, and he looked more sure of himself than he had all spring. It made Jim joyful just to see it.

"So are we going?" Jim asked.

"Yes," Spock said. "Yes, I suppose we are." He sounded surprised to have made that decision.

"Good," Scotty said, nodding.

"Oh, by the way, Spock, you were right about one thing," McCoy said.

"That is gratifying to hear," he replied. "And what was that?"

"My future. As soon as we get back I'm accepting the MD/PhD slot at UC San Francisco."

"I am pleased to hear that, Leonard," Spock said, almost smiling. "A very logical decision."

"I reckoned you'd see it that way," McCoy replied.

Jim couldn't quite catch McCoy's eye, but he was grinning like anything.

"So let's see," Scotty said slowly. "McCoy agreed that Spock was right about him. Spock agreed that McCoy was right about _him_. Jim Kirk walked away from snogging a beautiful blonde on the beach." He paused, nibbling on some bacon. "Is it Opposites Day and no one told me?"

"Nah," Jim said. "That would require you to be calm and quiet and—huh, come to think of it, maybe it is."

* * *

On the drive north Jim insisted they play every road trip game they knew and even made up a few, just to keep Spock's mind off of Nyota for a few hours. McCoy was driving as fast as the law and the jalopy would allow, and Scotty shouted out when he saw a truck stop, so they could refill on coffee and sandwiches.

When they finally arrived in Pennsylvania it was nearly ten p.m., and Jim suddenly realized that perhaps they should have called ahead. They all piled out of the car and knocked on the front door.

Christine opened the door, and seemed to take in the entire situation at a glance. "Nyota is out on the porch. Just a moment and I'll get her."

"Thanks," Jim said.

But Spock apparently couldn't wait, now that he'd decided on a course of action, and started walking around the side of the house just as Nyota, who must have heard them, did the same. They met in the middle, under one of the lamps illuminating the side garden, and as the others watched Spock first reached out to her, then dropped to his knees before her. She embraced him, clutching his head to her waist, and even the excited shouting of their friends could not take their attention from each other.

 

* * *

 

  


**Harvard Class of 1963**  
_Fifth Anniversary Report_  


 

JAMES TIBERIUS KIRK. _Address_ Some APO or another, keeps changing—ask Bones, he'll know. _Occupation_ Captain, USAF.

II. The farmer took a look at the motley crew at his door, and said that yes, they could stay the night, but they would have to share the guest bedroom on the first floor. You see, the farmer had three very beautiful daughters and he did not want their innocence robbed from them by three strange men in the middle of the night. (The farmer also had an even more beautiful wife but unfortunately his romantic adventures are not part of this story.) The stairs creaked, the farmer was a light sleeper, and he always kept a rifle close by.

 

LEONARD HORATIO MCCOY. _Address_ San Francisco, Calif. _Occupation_ Doctor; graduate student. _Degrees_ MD, Univ. of Calif. San Francisco. _Wife_ Jocelyn (Univ. of Miss., '63), September 4, 1963. _Children_ Joanna, b August 23, 1964.

III. After having dinner with the farmer and his family, including the three very beautiful daughters, the travelers retired to the spare bedroom where the engineer immediately began to come up with a scheme to sneak into the daughters' bedroom. Seeing the engineer's determination, the doctor and the philosopher decided to help him with his plans. Not for their own benefit—they had beautiful and somewhat vengeful ladies of their own awaiting them in California—but so the engineer didn't get his fool head blown off by some idiotic impulsive farmer who probably shouldn't be allowed near any kind of weaponry.

 

MONTGOMERY SCOTT. _Address_ Pasadena, Calif. _Occupation_ Graduate student, California Institute of Technology.

I. A doctor, a philosopher, and an engineer, having met in Cambridge, were to travel together to California. None of them had been further west than the Ohio River, so they decided to drive and see what they could see of this beautiful country. Despite having a very fine engineer in their company, their car came to an unexpected stop near a farm in Iowa, and they would go nowhere until morning. (The engineer presumed that another of the company forgot to fill the gas tank, as they were driving a vastly inefficient though beautiful American car.)

 

SPOCK. _Address_ Berkeley, Calif. _Occupation_ Assistant Professor, History and Philosophy of Science, Univ. of Calif. at Berkeley. _Degree_ PhD, Harvard University. _Wife_ Nyota Uhura '63, October 15, 1967.

IV. "Farmer's daughter" jokes are typically told by prepubescent males who have only recently triumphed over their oedipal conflict and/or fears of castration and feminization. The scenarios allow the joke teller to indulge in and then discard various regressive fantasies that the subject, due to their development of the superego, now understands as socially inappropriate or taboo. This reinforces gender identity among prepubescent males, aiding them in their transfer of identification to the same-sex parent while also solidifying relationships among same-sex peers.

The telling of these jokes by post-pubescent males, therefore, can only be categorized as a joke in itself. However in this instance the joke is not in service of the teller, but rather at his expense.

 

* * *

 

  


**Harvard Class of 1963**  
_Tenth Anniversary Report_  


 

JAMES TIBERIUS KIRK. _Address_ US Embassy, Saigon. _Occupation_ Colonel, USAF. _Children_ David, b September 28, 1970.

Poor Carol, she fell between reunion reports. But even though the marriage was short it was worth it just for David, who's an amazing kid even at three. Now I get what all of you have been saying about it changing your life. And he's practically growing up in her lab, which I heartily approve of. Given the work I'm doing now, I probably see him just as much as I might have if we were still married.

Hot war, cold war, it's all the same from this angle—and we really are doing all we can to hand over the fighting to the folks here and bring our boys home. It's tricky stuff, and how I got a reputation for being _diplomatic_ I'll never know, but it's rewarding work, out there in the trenches. Er, so to speak.

 

LEONARD HORATIO MCCOY. _Address_ San Francisco, Calif. _Occupation_ Doctor, researcher in infectious diseases. _Degrees_ MD, Univ. of Calif. San Francisco; PhD, Univ. of Calif. at Berkeley. _Children_ Joanna, b August 23, 1964.

I swear my next project will be on the infectious nature of divorce, as it seems to be breaking out all over. Well, we agreed that she gets east of the Mississippi, and I get west. Jo's in Georgia with her mother, but she's with me in California for the summers, and in the meantime I've made the house into a kind of supplemental dorm for the medical school, putting students in the empty rooms. Keeps the place full and my mortgage paid even with the settlement and the alimony and the child support and … oh there goes my paycheck. Jo's come through it like a real trouper, though; I'm proud of her, and wouldn't be surprised if _she_ becomes a Cliffie when the time comes.

Good friends can get you through most anything, though, and I'm lucky to have a cluster of them here in the Bay Area. Not sure if Spock and Scotty lead me _to_ the bourbon or away from it, but either way they're usually there when it happens.

 

MONTGOMERY SCOTT. _Address_ Palo Alto, Calif. _Degree_ PhD, California Institute of Technology. _Occupation_ Professor of Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering, Stanford University.

I admit I'm feeling a little out of step as I've neither had a kid nor got a divorce (haven't even got married!) but I reckon the engines are my children. Better that than the students.

Which means that not much has changed, other than getting that degree finally and going from one school to another. Still trying to teach overprivileged Americans that being a good engineer means getting grease on your hands, not just sitting at a draft table with a pencil and a slide rule. Still attending the charity parties of my friend Gaila, though you shouldn't believe anything you might see in the gossip papers. Still carousing with McCoy and Spock and Kirk when he's in town, though I'm also attending a great many children's birthday parties these days. Just call me Uncle Scotty!

 

SPOCK. _Address_ Berkeley, Calif. _Occupation_ Professor, Philosophy of Science and Logic, Univ. of Calif. at Berkeley. _Degree_ PhD, Harvard University. _Wife_ Nyota Uhura '63, October 15, 1967. _Children_ Isaac and Rebeccah, b May 17, 1970.

As you can see, Nyota and I have become parents since the last annual. We have agreed to adjust both of our schedules to accommodate the children, which has worked out rather well so far, as Nyota was able to finish her book and was granted tenure in the linguistics department here at Berkeley last year. I am sure that it will become easier once the children begin school.

My own research continues, of course, furthering my philosophical ideas about physics that were in my undergraduate and graduate theses and both of my books. I have been considering more and more the effect of the closed scientific community on research, particularly as my friends Leonard McCoy, Montgomery Scott and Christine Chapel all have both a practical and a theoretical side to their work and are brilliant at balancing those two elements. I wonder if some elements of theoretical science might have moved differently if the scientists in question had been more aware of the possible practical applications of their work. Could they have shaped those applications, if they had wanted to? Should they be allowed to?

* * *

**the amazing mr memory**

 

_May, 1977_

The first phone call came on a Thursday.

"McCoy."

"Hello, Leonard. This is Spock."

Now Spock wasn't in the habit of calling anyone to chat, so hearing his voice on the other end of the line in the middle of a weekday was … odd. But McCoy was in his office catching up on some medical journals and frankly didn't mind the distraction.

"We still on for dinner Saturday?"

"Yes, of course."

"Great. So. What can I do you for?"

Spock cleared his throat. "You do not usually have students in your house after the term ends, do you?" he asked.

"No," McCoy replied. "They cleared out last week."

"Right." Spock was quiet again, and then asked, "And when does Joanna arrive?"

"25th of June. Spock, what's this about?"

"Will you be home this evening?" Spock asked.

"Yes, why?"

"Keep your line free," he replied and hung up.

McCoy stared at the handset for a minute before putting it back in its cradle. "Dammit, Jim," he sighed, then went back to his reading.

* * *

The second phone call came that night.

"Hello?"

"Don't say my name," the voice said quickly.

McCoy rolled his eyes. "Only you."

"C'mon," Jim said. "I'm a pro."

"Whaddya need?"

"Not here. Check tomorrow morning's paper."

"Tomorrow's paper, got it. But—"

Of course Jim had hung up.

Friday morning McCoy grabbed the _Chronicle_ that had been duly tossed up on his front porch by the paperboy and carried it with him to the trolley stop. As he rode into his lab at UCSF, he carefully paged through the paper, finally finding Jim's signal in the movie section—a red circle around a matinee showing of _Star Wars_.

With the term over he was on his summer schedule, which was significantly lighter so he could spend as much time with Joanna during her summer visits as possible. In practical terms this meant no shifts in the clinic, only occasional consults at the hospital, and the post-docs taking over the day-to-day running of his lab. Jim knew all of that, or at least, McCoy was reasonably sure that he'd discussed his summer schedule with Jim since they talked about everything else, so it was only _slightly_ unsettling that Jim assumed McCoy could make a 1pm movie downtown. Well, all he'd planned to do that day was catch up on some paperwork.

McCoy had never been to this particular cinema, a dumpy little place that catered to the student crowd. He sat in the middle of the back row, since that's where they'd always sat in movies when they were at school, with popcorn and Milk Duds and soda (hey, he'd had worse lunches). The theater was small but empty, with only six other people there when the previews started. They were mostly kids' movies—Herbie, Benji, the new Disney movie featuring two mice riding on the back of a bird, plus the new Bond. McCoy wondered if Jo's upcoming thirteenth birthday meant that she was too old for Disney. The thought of that made him feel a little sad.

It wasn't until the cantina scene that a man clad in jeans and a hooded sweatshirt loped into the theater and sat down next to him. McCoy handed him the popcorn.

"How'd you know it was me?" Jim whispered.

"_No one_ moves like you," he answered.

Jim huffed, then grabbed a handful of popcorn. "Extra butter! Aww, you remembered. I'm touched. Where are the Milk Duds?"

McCoy handed the box over.

"You take good care of me," he said as he munched. "I hope you've already seen this."

"Saw it with Scotty and Gaila last week."

"Just the once?"

"Well, I reckon I'll see it again when Jo gets here. Why?"

"Jeez, Bones, I've seen it five times. It's just like Buck Rogers!"

McCoy scowled. "Was all this cloak and dagger stuff just to get me alone in a movie theater? I mean, I'm flattered, but you coulda just called."

Jim laughed at that. "As much as I'd love to sit in the back of this theater and neck with you, I actually need your house."

"Yeah, I got that from Spock's questions," McCoy said, more grouchily than he meant it. After their respective divorces they'd been teasing each other more openly, but the image of making out with Jim still got to him. "What do you want with my house?"

"I need a safe house," he replied.

"Aren't those things usually in the country?"

"Just in the movies. It's actually easier to secure a free-standing house in a developed area. Also your neighbors are used to people coming in and out of there are all hours. And _you_ have a remarkably advanced security clearance."

McCoy shrugged. "Government grants. But Jo—"   
"We'll be out of there before she arrives," Jim said.

"When would you need it?"

"Saturday."

McCoy thought for a moment. "Fine, just promise you won't wreck anything."

Jim grinned. "We won't. Besides, you'll be handsomely compensated. Probably best to pack up anything irreplaceable. You know, just in case. Oh, and make sure there's room in your garage for a large van."

"You fill me with confidence," McCoy said. "So what now?"

"Now we watch the rest of the movie, Bones. Ooh, I love this part."

* * *

Making your house into a kind of supplementary dorm for medical residents meant that you didn't keep irreplaceable objects in common areas to begin with. McCoy's grandmother's quilts were tucked into the hope chest that had belonged to his mother and would be passed down to Jo when the time came. The little treasures Jim had sent him from his various travels were in his office at the lab. At least he could display his—Jim had sent the Spocks nothing but fertility gods until the twins were born.

On Saturday morning he made himself some coffee and toast and went out on his front porch to do the crossword and wait. He didn't have much trouble picking out Jim's vehicle when it came up the street—there weren't many Chevy vans with an airbrush painting of the solar system driving around Noe Valley. McCoy walked down the steps to the ground level and pulled the garage door closed behind them. Airmen were piling out of the van like clowns, or at least he assumed they were airmen. They dressed like some of his students, in flared jeans, denim jackets and ridiculous t-shirts, but their hair was a bit shorter than the average college kid and as they came into the house they addressed him as "sir."

Jim climbed out last, a solemn young man next to him. "Men, this is Dr. Leonard McCoy, who has generously leant us his home. Bones, this is—

"Pavel Andreyevich Chekov," McCoy answered, shaking the man's hand.

"You read the papers," Jim said.

McCoy shrugged. "And I talk to Spock."

Chekov's eyes flew open. "You know Professor Spock also?" he asked in a heavy Russian accent. "He is inspiration for my defection—his book on responsibility of scientists."

McCoy nodded. "Well, for what it's worth I think you're a very brave man."

The corners of his lips turned down. "My parents are dead. There was nothing to keep me."

"Only everything you know," McCoy replied. "It isn't as simple to leave all that behind as people think. Believe me, I understand."

Jim chuckled. "When he gets like this, Chekov, it's best to just agree with him."

"Very well, then I am brave," Chekov said.

"Good," Jim said. "Let's go upstairs."

McCoy was impressed by the airmen's efficiency. It took them mere moments to secure the house to their satisfaction. His was just another San Francisco Victorian, with a garage on the ground floor and steps up to a porch at the front door that let into the second floor of kitchen, dining room and living room. The third floor had four bedrooms, so Chekov, Jim, and another officer named Sulu would stay up there with McCoy. Mitchell and Riley were to stay in the bedrooms on the first floor. Sulu began placing recording equipment in the dining room, and McCoy realized that his house was being used to debrief Chekov—hence the need for his own security clearance.

After leading Chekov to his room McCoy wandered back down to the kitchen, wondering if he should give the airmen coffee or breakfast, and a little annoyed with himself for not having thought of it. Then Sulu came up from the garage carrying four large paper bags and set them on the kitchen counter.

"We took the liberty of buying groceries, sir," he said, starting to unpack the bags.

"Not sir," McCoy replied, helping to put things away. "McCoy. Doctor if you must."

Sulu nodded. "The colonel said he hoped you still had custody of the waffle iron?"

McCoy barked out a laugh. "He would—it was his wedding present to me. I have it, but it doesn't work too well these days."

"That's fine, Bones," Jim said, patting McCoy's shoulder as he walked into the kitchen. "We can go to Penny's and get you another one." He pulled a mixing bowl down from the cabinet. "Sulu, why don't you see if Mitchell or Riley need any assistance while I get breakfast started?"

Sulu looked over McCoy's shoulder and McCoy turned to see Chekov standing in the kitchen doorway. "Yes sir," he said, and headed downstairs.

McCoy took a seat at one of the stools at the kitchen counter. "Kirk here has an obsession with breakfast foods," McCoy said, as much to Jim as to Chekov.

"It's the most important meal of the day," Jim said, smiling. "And it reminds me of you."

"It's the only meal you can reliably cook," McCoy said, watching Jim mix up the pancake batter.

"The only meal you'll _let_ me cook," Jim replied.

"You have known the colonel a long time then?" Chekov asked.

"We've known each other all our lives," Jim said. "The part that counts, anyway."

After breakfast Jim, Sulu and Chekov went into the dining room and got started, Mitchell and his buddy Riley settled themselves at the doors, and McCoy went into his office to tackle a new grant application and some recommendation letters he'd been putting off. He'd forgotten that pleasant feeling of working at home and knowing that other people were working as well, something he hadn't felt since their rooms in Lowell House. A sandwich materialized at his elbow a little after noon, brought by Riley but surely either made or at least dictated by Jim because it was perfect: liverwurst, onions, that horseradish mayo stuff, rye toast.

In the afternoon he went out into the back yard and puttered around, though Riley had already mowed the lawn that morning—his bright idea of a cover for assessing the fence and the neighbors on the other side of it and hey, McCoy wasn't going to argue with that. He checked the flower beds that he and Jo had set out so many years ago, when she was a tiny thing digging in the soil with a plastic shovel from her sand box. He knew they'd be the first things she'd want to see when she arrived. He looked up and saw Jim, evidently on a break, walking out to him with a can of Coors from the fridge.

"You know there's a whole movie coming out about how you can't get this on the east coast?" Jim asked, pulling the tab on his own Fresca. "Dunno what the fuss is."

"Scarcity?" McCoy asked, shrugging.

"Maybe," Jim said, rubbing a hand across the back of his neck and definitely _not_ looking him in the eye.

"All right, out with it," McCoy said, because if that wasn't Jim's universal gesture of "what I have to say you might not want to hear" he didn't know what was.

Jim chuckled. "I've invited a couple people over to dinner tonight, if that's all right."

"I'm not your damn wife, Jim," McCoy replied. "And apparently I'm not cooking any meals while your boys are here, so I don't know what I possibly could have to say about it. Is my security clearance high enough that I can sit at the big kids' table?"

"Your clearance is actually frighteningly high," Jim said. "Almost as high as mine. What have you been up to?"

"CDC stuff, mostly," he said. "They're always panicking about the Ruskies putting some bug in the water system or bringing back Spanish influenza. When events like Legionnaire's come up it makes them feel better to have a pissy virologist telling them to calm the fuck down."

"That should be your new title," Jim said, grinning. "Leonard Horatio McCoy, MD, PhD, pissy virologist."

* * *

For the sake of his own sanity, McCoy had learned not to get into guessing games with Jim Kirk. If Jim wanted him to know something, he'd tell him; if he didn't say, McCoy tried not to fuss over it. Plenty of time to be annoyed when the secret was revealed, and anyway, he wasn't quite as good as Spock was at anticipating Jim's behavior. So he didn't spend the afternoon wondering who was going to be at his dinner table, and instead puttered around and watched Sulu help Chekov make some kind of Russian feast while Jim took the van to pick up their guests.

That said, as soon as he heard the doorbell ring he knew who was on the other side of it. Only Spock always insisted on coming in through the front door, and only Spock would ring the doorbell even though he had been brought over to the house personally by Jim. And yet, when he opened the door, he was still surprised at who was standing behind Spock.

"Scotty?" he asked.

Scotty beamed. "Long time no see, eh?" he said as he walked in.

"Yeah, long time like two weeks ago," McCoy replied, shaking his hand. "What gives, Jim?"

"One of the many projects the Sovs had Chekov working on was a new jet engine. Scotty knows all the lingo, and besides, who'd think anything of him coming by your house?"

"What makes you think that anyone is paying attention to who is coming and going from my house in the first place?" he asked.

"Bones, please," Jim said.

He sighed. "So you drove all the way down to Palo Alto, then up to Berkeley, and back here, in that ridiculous van?"

"Hey," Jim replied, poking him in the chest, "that van is a sweet ride, as the kids say. Play your cards right and maybe I'll take you out for a spin."

"I should be so lucky," McCoy replied, rolling his eyes.

Chekov, upon seeing Spock again, was overcome by hero worship. He was frustrated trying to express himself adequately in English, but once Spock showed himself perfectly fluent in Russian the defector began babbling excitedly. It was actually sort of sweet. McCoy tried not to think about how inexplicably sexy Jim was when _he_ spoke Russian—always had been, even back at school when he and Nyota would lapse into it on occasion. But at least he had Scotty to distract him by actually speaking English while they dined on borscht, salmon, boiled potatoes, cucumbers, brown bread and possibly more dill than McCoy had ever seen on one table.

After dessert he and Scotty left them to it and moved out onto the back porch. Riley was walking around the yard below them, checking the perimeter, and even Scotty was somewhat subdued, enjoying the gorgeous night. McCoy listened to the Russian drifting out of the window and felt strangely serene. Maybe Jim was right; maybe a little chaos was good for the soul.

"So," Scotty said. "You and Jim are getting along well."

McCoy scowled. "Why wouldn't we be?"

Scotty cocked his head.

Sometimes the bush telegraph that connected their college gang of eight was damned useful, such as when he hadn't had to tell everyone about the final, disastrous failure of his marriage. Other times he wondered if he would ever have any actual privacy again. "So you heard about that Tokyo trip," he said.

"You two spend two weeks in Japan mostly shouting at each other and sending tense postcards, people are going to find out."

"That was four years ago!"

Scotty shrugged.

"It was _cathartic_," McCoy said. "By the end we were aces, and we still are."

"I can see that," Scotty said. "I'm _glad_ to see it."

McCoy looked at his friend, face half-shadowed in the dim light. For all his eccentricities and seeming aloofness, Scotty had always been the one holding them together through the rough spots. "Me too," he replied. "Where are you staying?"

"Gaila's flat," he replied, referring to her pied-a-terre in Pacific Heights, as opposed to the family townhouse on Nob Hill or the estate south of the city. "She's in Capri."

"And you're not with her because?"

"Because we're neither married nor joined at the hip?" Scotty said. "Because I had finals to grade and an oral exam to give?"

"Right. And when are you leaving for Italy?"

Scotty grimaced. "As soon as Jim's done with me," he said. "Happy?"

"Ecstatic," McCoy said, laughing. "Oh, and Christine told me you agreed. That's a great thing you're doing for her and Janice."

"Well, I reckon I'm doing it for myself, too," he replied. "Do you—who else knows?"

McCoy shrugged. "The Spocks know about Christine and Janice's relationship, but I don't think they know about what you're doing yet—at least, Nyota didn't mention it when I saw her last week. Jim, well, when do we ever know what Jim knows."

"You know Jan asked Gaila about it before she asked me?" he said.

"Of course she did, Scotty," McCoy replied. "I don't know who you two think you're fooling aside from yourselves."

"Who _we're_ fooling?" Scotty asked, chuckling. "What about you?"

"What do you mean?" McCoy asked.

But Scotty didn't reply, instead nodding his head toward the door.

When McCoy turned he was surprised to see Lt. Sulu. "Enough Russian for ya?" McCoy asked.

Sulu shrugged. "They're talking physics now," he replied. "Dunno how the colonel can follow them."

"He probably can't," Scotty said, grinning.

"He's attracted to expertise," McCoy said. "He always has liked listening to people in their element."

"Probably what makes him a good officer," Scotty added.

"He is that," Sulu replied.

"Well, that dishwasher ain't gonna load itself," McCoy said, and the three of them headed back into the kitchen. But there they found Chekov, scraping plates.

"Dr. Chekov you don't need to be doing that," Sulu said. "You made dinner."

"I want to," Chekov said firmly. "I can carry my weight. And I wanted Kirk to visit with his friend. He's spent enough time entertaining me."

"I'm sure Jim doesn't mind one bit," Scotty said.

"Here, I'll help you," Sulu said, starting to rinse off the plates.

Jim poked his head out of the dining room. "Ah, there you are. I wondered where you'd wandered off to. Can you two come in here?"

"Sure," McCoy said.

"Sulu, we're going to be in here for a while. Take care of our man; make sure he has whatever he needs."

"Yes, sir," Sulu said.

"Thank you, sir," Chekov said.

Jim closed the door behind them. "Cards, Bones?" Jim had that _look_, had had it all day, of needing to Make an Announcement. McCoy kept thinking it was Chekov, or Spock and Scotty coming by, but clearly there was more, and the four of them had always talked better when there was something in the middle of the table—if not food, cards would do.

McCoy pulled playing cards and a pad and pen from the top drawer of the side cabinet. "Rummy," he said. "I'm not playing poker with this crew."

Once the cards were dealt and they were all arranging their hands, Jim said, "So I'm thinking about leaving the air force next year."

Typical Jim to give out big news so casually. Even Spock raised his eyebrows. There was a pause as the others stared at him, and then Scotty asked, "Why next year, Jim?"

"I'll be at fifteen years of service, which with the combat time in Vietnam and my rank means a pension, so whatever I do after this David will be provided for." He drew and discarded. "Plus I've been hearing that thanks to this little escapade, among other things, they're giving me my star soon."

"Wow, who would have thought," McCoy said. "General Kirk. And how did you hear about this?"

Jim shrugged. "Word gets around. And my next assignment is to go back to Hawaii, to the base I was at when I met Carol, and basically be General Pike's right hand man for at least the summer if not longer. Which means, they're teaching me how to run a base myself. Not surprising, since this thing with Chekov means I can't return to Moscow any time soon."

"I would think," Spock said, "that a promotion to general would be a reason to remain in the service, not to retire." He placed a set of threes in front of him.

"Yeah, you know what generals do?" Jim asked. "They sit in offices and give orders. Or they sit in the Pentagon and think up strategies that if they're really good don't get too changed by their superiors or the folks at State. Or if they're lucky, like Pike, they run a base and spend their time making nice with the locals and translating those strategies into something actually worth doing. But they aren't the ones on the ground making things happen."

"The armed services give you a unique opportunity to make things happen now, Jim." Spock said. "How would you replicate that in civilian life?"

"I met up with Gaila a few weeks ago in Germany," he replied. "She needs someone to run that foundation of hers, focus their efforts. I think with a little know-how and the right people we could even turn it into a real NGO if we wanted to. She was talking about picking up on all that responsibility stuff you've been talking about, Spock. And Bones, I'd want to talk to you about that stint you did with Doctors Without Borders."

McCoy played a jack on a run of Scotty's, and discarded. "Be glad to," he said.

Spock drew a card. "Are you sure, Jim, that yours and Gaila's relationship is suited to working together in such a fashion?" he asked.

"Look, I know that Gaila can be kinda kooky," Jim said, "but even you have to admit that she's perfectly capable of rational thought when she wants to be. Anyway she'd be doing the fundraising and outreach to the rich and powerful, which she does now anyway. I'd be in charge of implementation. I guess something about Brigadier General, Retired makes people sit up and take you seriously, while madcap heiress doesn't, even with the Radcliffe degree." He looked down at the discard pile, then picked up all of the cards.

"But who would decide where those efforts should be focused?" Spock asked.

"I can answer that," Scotty said. "Gaila's been talking about getting a board of directors and running the place like a proper foundation."

"Of whom would that board consist?" Spock asked.

"Oh, us," Scotty said. "The eight of us. That's her idea right now, at least."

"And I think it's a good one," Jim said. He'd finally finished shuffling through his cards, setting down two runs before discarding. "We're a pretty diverse bunch, all things considered."

"I do not think a philosophy professor—"

"Spock, honestly," McCoy said. "You inspired a kid genius to defect from the Soviet Union with this responsible scientist stuff."

"He's right," Jim said. "All I did was get him out of a hotel full of KGB. You're the one who made him _want_ to leave."

"I admit, though I am always pleased to see how influential the book has become, when Chekov contacted me at that conference in Helsinki I was very surprised," Spock said.

"Well, at least you thought to find me," Jim said.

"I would do nothing else, Jim," Spock said. "I must admit, your decision to retire does appear well thought-out."

"But is it logical?" Scotty asked, grinning.

"I have found that life decisions are rarely entirely logical," Spock admitted. "Otherwise, I would not now be married, and we would not have the twins."

"You mean, married to Nyota?" McCoy asked.

"I could have married no one else," Spock replied. "But as to your question, Scotty, I would say that Jim's reasoning is sound. Also, I am out," he said, putting his last card in the discard pile.

"You would go out when I had all this shit in my hand," Jim said, setting the cards down in disgust.

"Serves you right," McCoy said as he set down the scores.

"Taking risks is worth it in the long run," Jim said, sliding his cards over to Scotty. "At least I think so."

"It's a good plan, Jim," Scotty said. "I know it will take a weight off Gaila's mind to have you in there with her. There's so many folks around her she can't really trust. I think that's why she spends her time with us."

"Oh I'm sure that's not the only reason," McCoy said, smiling.

"I'm just her designated escort," Scotty replied. "Her friends think I'm funny. We're not an item, no matter what these silly papers say."

"Of course not," Spock said. "We all spend major holidays with our designated escorts."

"All right, enough of that," Scotty said firmly. "Back to Jim."

"Yeah, back to me," Jim said. "Bones, you haven't said what _you_ think of this."

"Well," McCoy said, watching Scotty deal, "what I want to know is, why now? You'd get a much better pension if you stayed in for another five years, and you probably could have run Gaila's foundation any time you wanted to. So why now?"

Jim looked at his cards. "You found me out, Bones, as usual," he said. "I called Carol last week to let her know about the Honolulu assignment and when she put David on—you know I haven't seen him in eight months? He was so excited about spending the summer with me."

"Of course he was," McCoy said.

"I grew up without a dad and I just don't want that for my son," Jim said. "If I retire now, I can settle down in one place and see a lot more of him. Carol's got her career too—I'm sure we can come up with some kind of arrangement."

"Where would you be settling?" McCoy asked.

Jim cocked his head. "Here in San Francisco, of course. Even if David does stay in Honolulu, we're as close as anyone could be, here. And all of you are here." He smiled at McCoy. "Why would I go anyplace else?"

McCoy blinked. The idea of Jim being permanently anyplace was strange enough, let alone living in the same city. He felt overwhelmed. "Well, that would be something," he said.

"Aww, Bones, don't you want me as your new neighbor?" Jim asked. "I'm hurt."

"Of course I do, idiot," McCoy growled. "It's just unexpected, is all."

"You know Len here doesn't like change," Scotty said. "Be easy on him."

"Oh I will be," Jim said, smiling. "Don't you worry."

"Famous last words if ever I heard them," McCoy replied.

* * *

Jim established a routine fairly quickly: the debriefing would start in the dining room immediately after an early breakfast and then end for the day before a late dinner. Spock only came that one night, not only because he wasn't really needed but also because he was pretty much shit at keeping anything from Nyota. But Scotty hung around for three days, leaving for Italy on Wednesday morning with all necessary and unnecessary teasing from Jim and McCoy.

McCoy kept up his own regular life, mostly going into the lab to set up the summer projects and supervise the staff of grad students and post docs. Jim for whatever reason started packing a lunch for McCoy to take with him. McCoy accused him of being June Cleaver but Jim just replied that he was actually Donna Reed, not only because she was married to a doctor but also because she was "a sexy blond like myself." The sandwiches were good enough that McCoy was determined not to fret over it too much—it had been a long time since someone else was cooking for him on a regular basis.

McCoy also maintained his regular Wednesday night phone call with Christine Chapel, holed up in his bedroom watching _Charlie's Angels_ on the little black and white tv and talking about everything and nothing. Sure, it was extravagant talking long distance for an hour, but it was at night and dammit it was worth it. Their divorces had been around the same time, back in 1970, and they found talking to each other to be a great relief, with everyone else in their circle either married or single—at the time Jim had been a newlywed and expectant father and therefore entirely useless. It was almost like when they were at school, the only engaged people, and they clung to each other now much as they had then. When Chris first left Roger she came west to stay with Janice in Big Sur for a while, and after a year the two of them moved down to San Diego when Christine got a research position at Scripps.

He and Christine were in the middle of something or other, likely something silly, when McCoy heard one of the extensions pick up and a voice say, "Oh, sorry," and hang up again. McCoy held his breath.

"Do I recognize that voice?" Christine asked.

"Look, Sabrina is running without a bra," McCoy said.

"Don't you try to distract me with Kate Jackson," Christine said. "Why is he there and why didn't you tell me?"

"I can't tell you, and because I can't tell you."

"Truly?" she asked.

"Truly."

Christine was quiet for a moment. "Well, now that I do know, how is that? Cozy?"

"Why do you ask?" McCoy said innocently, though he knew why—she was the only one he'd ever told about him and Jim in Europe.

"Len."

McCoy sighed. "There are other people here. It's not like we're alone. But I don't know. It's nice to come home to dinner again, and have people I know in the house. Honestly I'm trying not to think about it. There's other news, but I'll have to wait to tell you about that," he said, thinking of Jim's thoughts of retirement.

"Fair enough," she replied. "Just be careful."

McCoy wanted to say that there was nothing to be careful about, or that he wasn't any of the women left brokenhearted by Jim over the years, or even that those ladies had been fooling themselves. But instead he sighed and said, "I will, Chris."

As if on cue, there was a knock at the door. McCoy let Jim in and simply handed the phone over. "Hi Christine. … Yeah, you too. … Could you?" There was a pause, then, "Hello! Don't say my name. Will you be home later this month? Might be able to come see you both. … Good, good, I will let you know. … Me too. Okay, I'll give it back to them now."

McCoy and Christine said their goodbyes quickly, Jim smirking at McCoy all the while. He hung up and Jim sat down cross-legged at the foot of the bed.

"So," Jim said. "You've been on the phone with Christine for an hour? You never used to like talking on the phone."

"Yeah, well," McCoy said, rubbing plumping the pillow behind his back. "Chris is different."

Jim laughed. "Oh really?"

"Not you too!" McCoy said, scowling. "She only just finally got Nyota to stop trying to fix us up. Chris and I are real close, but it's just not gonna happen."

"No?" Jim asked. "Why are you so sure?"

"Well." He hesitated. "She's been looking in another direction."

"Oh?" Jim asked. "She has someone else?"

"Jim, it's not my story to tell."

Jim grinned suddenly, and clapped him on the shoulder. "You're a good friend, Bones."

"What?"

"I know what you're not telling," Jim said. "Janice told me a couple of months ago."

"She did?"

"Yeah, she sent a telegram, wanted me to call her. I guess you know this too—she wants to have a baby."

McCoy cocked his head. "And she wanted you to help her?"

"No, actually she was making sure I was okay with her asking Scotty first, since I have a son and he probably won't be having kids. Which I was." He smiled. "And then I asked why she needed anyone's help and she said she was with a woman now. I mean, you know Jan—she just comes right out and says what she means, at least with me. So I teased her about spoiling her for all men and asked if I know the lady in question and when she said, 'yep,' I said, 'well, good for you, Jan. Good for you.'"

"They seem pretty happy," McCoy said. "I haven't been down since Chris told me, but she sounds real good. Dunno why it took them so long to tell the rest of us—or, well, I do, but still. I mean, it's _us_."

"Yeah, well, you can never know. You know that."

McCoy nodded.

"I'm just glad she's found someone great like Christine. I adore Jan, but we would have had one of those awful young marriages with everyone in over their head and would've have hated each other once it was over. You and Christine—it might not have worked out for either of you, but at least you were ready for it. Hell, I wasn't even ready with Carol. But now …"

"Now you are?" McCoy asked, raising an eyebrow.

Jim smiled, a little sheepish. "Maybe, maybe I am. Still, even though Jan deserved better than me, I'm sorry she was alone so much." He toyed with a thread on the quilt. "But hey, that meant she had time to write to me."

"She did?" McCoy asked. "You never told me that."

"Once a week, like clockwork, from the time I went in. It was like a lifeline."

McCoy bit his lip. "I'm sorry, Jim. I—"

"No," Jim said firmly, holding up his hand. "You had other things on your mind. And we—we had to make a break."

McCoy felt a little sad, suddenly, at how his plunge into marriage and medical school and fatherhood so quickly after graduation had left Jim alone. "I suppose we did," he said.

"Speaking of which, I told Jan. About Myrtle Beach and Europe, I mean."

"Funny thing," McCoy said. "I told Chris."

"Huh," Jim said, his eyebrows knit together. He nodded, as if he'd decided something, then swung his legs off the bed. "Well, I should go check with the men before I turn in," he said, walking over to the door. He paused and said, "I think tomorrow is the last day. We're about done."

"Oh?" McCoy said, because of course this would end eventually; he just hadn't really been thinking about it.

"Maybe we should try to go see Chris and Jan," Jim continued. "I've asked for some leave after this mission is over."

"You only say that because you want to drive down to San Diego in that damn van," McCoy replied lightly.

Jim chuckled. "Probably. Good night, Bones."

"Good night, Jim."

McCoy sat up that night for quite a while, thinking about Jim and that Tokyo trip back in '73. It was the first chance they'd had to spend time together since the divorces, and emotions were running even higher than usual. Their anger and disappointment and confusion with themselves, with each other, with the universe was so intense McCoy could almost taste it in the air. Once the shouting started he wasn't sure how it was going to stop. Jim said at one point that they were either going to fight or fuck, but in the end they did neither. One night in the middle of the final week they were outside in a sauna at some kind of spa, bickering as they had been for the past ten days, when thanks to the steam or the sake or just sheer exhaustion they ended up clinging to each other and sobbing apologies that they needed to give more than they needed to hear. When they woke up the next morning McCoy felt like a weight had been lifted from his shoulders, and Jim smiled, really smiled for the first time since McCoy had arrived in Japan. Later he said, "We lost it, but we got it back last night."

Funny how Jim always talked about them like they were Rick and Ilsa.

Anyway he was right—after that things were pretty easy between them, even if they didn't see much of each other. That was when the teasing started, or anyway he'd thought it was teasing until this visit. Now he wondered if it hadn't been flirting all along.

* * *

Thursday night McCoy came home from the lab to the smell of dinner cooking, as he had all week, but also a large box sitting on his desk that really, he should have been expecting since Saturday morning.

"You like it?" Jim asked, popping his head in the door.

McCoy picked up the waffle iron and held it out. "Of course. It's the 'deluxe model,' how could I not like it?"

Jim moved into the room and took the box, flipping it over in his hands. "See, you can lift out the sides and flip them, and then you have an electric griddle. I noticed you don't have one."

"A griddle?" McCoy asked, looking at Jim.

Jim nodded, eyes on McCoy. "In your stove. Remember, in the Myrtle Beach house? I made pancakes on it?"

McCoy smiled. "Yeah, I remember," he replied.

"Well, now you can have waffles _and_ pancakes! In your own house!"

"That's great Jim," McCoy said, slapping him on the shoulder and pulling him into a rough half-embrace. "Thanks. Really."

"Sure," Jim said, relaxing into McCoy's touch for a moment before taking a step back. "Dinner'll be ready in a bit, so wash up," he said, and walked back into the kitchen.

Their meal that night was quieter than the past ones; all the men seemed to be preoccupied with their own thoughts. McCoy didn't mind not having to keep up his end of the conversation as it had been a strange week any way you looked at it. And what was strangest about it was that Jim slamming back into his house and making himself completely at home wasn't actually the strangest part. Nor was watching Jim in his element, putting the understandably jittery Chekov at ease and gaining his trust at the same time by letting him see Spock again. His men clearly thought he walked on water, and McCoy wasn't sure Jim couldn't if he really wanted to.

McCoy sat at the kitchen counter and watched Sulu and Chekov clean up after dinner, as they had done nearly every night while Riley and Mitchell performed their mysterious rituals that kept the house safe from the KGB. Jim had gone into the office to use the phone, door shut, and when he came out his expression was, well, not stern exactly. More like determined.

"Well, Pavel," Jim said, leaning on the counter, "it's official. We're handing you over to the feds tomorrow."

Chekov nodded, wiping his hands on a dish towel. "Where am I going next?" he asked.

Jim shook his head. "They didn't tell me. Everything's on a need-to-know basis and I … don't, apparently. Sorry."

Chekov shrugged. "Is okay. I suppose I should get ready to leave?"

"Yeah," Jim replied. "We'll go out after breakfast tomorrow."

Chekov headed upstairs, and Sulu grimly mumbled something about packing up the equipment and walked into the dining room.

McCoy sat up. "You arranged all this _over the phone_?" he asked. "Just now?"

"Jeez, Bones, what do you take me for?" Jim said, offended. "Of course not. I met up with their guy downtown at the JC Penny while I got the waffle iron. Two birds with one stone, better cover, et cetera."

He shook his head. "You're really something, Jim."

"Ain't I just?" Jim said, cocking his head. "I've gotta tell the others, but then it's you, me, the rest of that," he said, pointing at the leftover apple pie sitting on the counter, "and the bourbon I saw in your office."

"All right," McCoy said. While Jim was gone he put the pie in the toaster oven to warm up a little and pulled out some ice cream. It was their last night, after all; he figured they could use some a la mode. He was just setting down the tray with pie and coffee on the mostly-cleared-off desk when Jim came in.

"Oh, wow, Bones," he said, his eyes lighting up. "That's—wow. Good call."

"Thank you," McCoy said, handing him a spoon.

Jim took a bite and sat back in the chair, head tipped back and eyes closed. After a bit of nearly-orgasmic moaning, he said, "That's it. I'm retiring to San Francisco just so I can eat your apple pie with vanilla ice cream any time I want." He opened his eyes. "Will you still love me when I'm fat?"

"I will," McCoy said, "but your heart won't."

"Hmph," Jim replied, and sat up to grab another spoonful. "Where's the booze?"

"Not tonight," McCoy said lightly. "But there's coffee."

Jim looked up at him sharply from underneath his brows, suspicious. "Coffee it is" he said, and took a slurp. "So I got the leave I requested," he said. "Next two weeks."

"You certainly deserve it," McCoy replied.

"I think you should come with me to San Diego," he said.

"Jim, I know you've completely interrupted it, but I do have a life and responsibilities here."

"What I know," Jim said, "is that your lab will be just fine without you for a couple of weeks, and that Chris and Jan would love to see you."

"Well," McCoy said.

"I figure we can drive down, see some sights, take our time. We haven't had a road trip since you came to see me in Japan five years ago."

McCoy pressed his lips together. "At least this time let me drive," he said.

"Of course. And we'll get you back in plenty of time before Joanna gets here."

"Sounds like you've got it all worked out," McCoy said.

"Mostly," Jim replied. "I mean it about retirement by the way. I've made up my mind, gonna take the 15-year deal."

"I'm sure Gaila will be happy to hear that," McCoy replied.

"And I was wondering," he said, assembling another bite, "how you'd feel about having a housemate."

McCoy sat up. "A what?"

"You know, like _The Odd Couple_? Two divorced men sharing a house? I can pay my share, and you know I can cook, and come on, that whole med student boarding house thing has to be getting old."

"A little," McCoy said.

"We've lived together before, hell, we've even traveled together. We're good enough friends that we can work out any problems and it's a big enough house that you can just ignore me if you're really pissy."

McCoy shrugged. "Sure did that with Jocelyn, toward the end," he said.

Jim scowled. "Now don't bring _that_ up. That's a bad precedent. How about that fight we had in Osaka, or in Lisbon? We got through those all right."

"True," McCoy said.

"We have the same friends, give or take. And I wouldn't be moving in with very much stuff."

McCoy cocked his head. "You can't think that your moving in here wouldn't change things, Jim, no matter how much stuff you do or don't have."

"Maybe not," Jim said, very much _not_ looking at McCoy, "but you've liked it, this week, my being here. I know you have."

"You lured me with Russian child geniuses and liverwurst sandwiches."

Jim grinned at that.

McCoy took another bite of pie so he could be quiet for a bit and think. "You make a good argument, James Tiberius," he said.

"You don't sound entirely convinced, Leonard Horatio," Jim replied.

"Well, what I want to know is, on what terms would you be moving in here?"

"Terms?" Jim asked.

"Yeah, Jim," he said. "Are we gonna be just roommates, or something more?"

Jim's breath caught just a little, and McCoy had to be careful not to smile. That first time in Myrtle Beach Jim had taken him entirely by surprise but now he knew the man's tells. Jim squared his shoulders looked McCoy straight in the eye. "I guess that's up to you, Bones."

And really, that was fair, McCoy thought as he leaned forward and kissed him. Jim had made that first move after all. He reckoned he could make the last one. Jim tasted of ice cream and cinnamon, reminding McCoy of the chocolate milk and it was like the past and the present and the future were swirling all around them, their great big American future. He couldn't regret any of it, not one step of the circuitous path they'd been on, because it got them here, now.

McCoy pulled back, a little breathless, and pressed his forehead to Jim's. "A year, huh?" he asked.

"Give or take, yeah," Jim replied.

"I can wait," McCoy said. "Don't break your damn neck in the meantime, now."

Jim grinned. "I won't," he said. They kissed again, and then Jim pulled back. "We can't—"

"I know," McCoy said, and sat back in his chair. Then, before he could think about it too much, he pulled his class ring off his pinky finger and handed it to Jim.

"Why Beauregard," he said, batting his lashes and laying on a thick southern accent, "are you pinning me?"

"Shut up," McCoy said. "Look, it's not inscribed or anything, and it's your class too. No one would know."

"I'll know," Jim said, sliding the ring onto his finger. "You trying to keep me faithful, Bones?"

"Maybe."

"All right." He smiled. "Well, we should probably go up now, or I won't be able to keep from fucking you in this room."

"Yeah," McCoy said, nodding. "All right."

It was oddly comforting, hitting the lights and walking up the stairs with Jim, even if they weren't going to the same bedroom. McCoy saw Chekov and Sulu sitting on Chekov's bed looking at a photo album.

"Don't stay up too late, fellas," Jim said. "Early morning."

"Yes, sir," Sulu said.

"Good night, Bones," Jim said, and McCoy could see that Jim was fiddling with the ring.

He smiled. "Good night, Jim," he said.

* * *

Friday morning Jim made everyone waffles, and after breakfast the airmen hustled Chekov off to meet the FBI in their ridiculous painted van. McCoy left soon after them—okay, so he was avoiding the emptiness of the house, something he hadn't noticed before—to run errands. He went down to the lab to make arrangements for two weeks away, got a guide book to the California coast at the campus bookstore, and almost bought new swim trunks before deciding that he wasn't going on his honeymoon, dammit, and since he was the one who gave _Jim_ a ring maybe he should stop acting like a girl.

Then he drove up to his house, and there was Jim, sitting on the porch eating pistachio nuts. He grinned up at McCoy. "I got maps," he said, holding up a handful. "I know how you like to plan this stuff."

"Thanks," he said, taking a seat next to him. "So are we taking my car or are you going to insist on that van?"

Jim grinned. "That van belongs to the Department of Defense." He paused, knocked a few more nuts into his mouth. "At least, in two weeks it will."

"I swear to God, Jim, you put a mattress in the back of that thing, don't expect _me_ to be sleeping on it."

The two men left Friday afternoon and took their time, stopping often as they drove south along the PCH. They finally arrived at Chris and Jan's Sunday evening. Jim wanted to see if Chris or Jan would work it out so as they got out of the van and walked down the drive for welcome hugs they stayed a careful friendly distance apart. But McCoy could see Jan's eyes as they looked from Jim's face, to his hand with the ring, to McCoy's own hand without a ring. She stared for a good minute—long enough that Chris asked what she was looking at—and then broke into a grin. "Well it's about time," she said.

"Yeah," Jim said. "About the right time."

* * *

 

  


**Harvard Class of 1963**  
_Fifteenth Anniversary Report_  


 

JAMES TIBERIUS KIRK. _Address_ San Francisco, CA. _Occupation_ Brig. Gen., USAF. _Children_ David, b September 28, 1970.

Can two men share a house without driving each other crazy? We'll find out—I'm leaving the Air Force this summer after fifteen years and moving in with my old roommate Leonard McCoy while I take over as the administrator of a charitable foundation. Far better for me than being stuck at the Pentagon, and I get a pension besides.

Now that I'm settled in one place for a while I'll get to see my son more, too. He's nearly eight, hilarious and headstrong, and the goal for this winter is to get him to Iowa because he's never seen snow!

 

LEONARD HORATIO MCCOY. _Address_ San Francisco, CA. _Occupation_ Doctor, researcher in infectious diseases. _Degrees_ MD, UCSF; PhD, UC Berkeley. _Children_ Joanna, b August 23, 1964.

Yes, at my age, I'm about to have a roommate. But at least he's a known quantity, and the military has forced him into neater habits. Other than that, things are much the same, and I spend much of my day staring at viruses or making sure my grad students are actually doing what they should be. Some days, clinic is a blessed relief from the lab, some days just the opposite, so it's probably good that I have both to keep me busy. That, a teenage daughter and a new roommate are about all I can handle at present.

 

MONTGOMERY SCOTT. _Address_ Palo Alto, CA. _Occupation_ Professor of Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering, Stanford University. _Degree_ PhD, California Institute of Technology.

What can I say? Not much has changed, and life has settled into a comfortable routine of work at Stanford and play elsewhere. Classmates finding themselves in the Bay Area should definitely give me a call.

 

SPOCK. _Address_ Berkeley, CA. _Occupation_ Professor, Philosophy of Science and Logic, UC Berkeley. _Degree_ PhD, Harvard University. _Wife_ Nyota Uhura '63, October 15, 1967. _Children_ Isaac and Rebeccah, b May 17, 1970.

We had our moment in the spotlight last year, thanks to Dr. Chekov, and it is a strange thing to think that one's work might inspire others to such actions. The children are in school, making our daily lives a bit less hectic, and I am taking some time now to focus on teaching and reading, both of which are rejuvenating. I suspect that Isaac and Rebeccah will have an influence on my philosophy that I could never have predicted. Nyota, however, seems entirely unsurprised. Children are many things, but always fascinating.

 

* * *

 

  


**Harvard Class of 1963**  
_Twentieth Anniversary Report_  


 

JAMES TIBERIUS KIRK. _Address_ San Francisco, CA. _Occupation_ Brig. Gen., USAF (Ret.); Director, The Orion Fund. _Partner_ Leonard McCoy '63. _Children_ David, b September 28, 1970.

Right, so, not exactly a roommate. Some part of me thinks this should feel like a bigger change but it's been coming along so gradually that I can't see it as much of one. Besides, if you're going to be gay, San Francisco is a damn good place to be.

Another change that _is_ a change is that my son will be living with me and attending high school here in San Francisco. It will be interesting, to say the least. Leonard's already been through it with his daughter but I suspect that I'll also be relying on Spock, and he on me. But come to think of it, that's nothing new, either.

Directing a large charitable foundation has been a welcome and rewarding challenge. We've invested in many different programs around the world, but the constant theme is an individual's ability to control their own sexuality, be it our efforts against girls being sold into brothels, or combatting female genital mutilation, or working for reproductive rights or homosexual rights around the world as well as here in the US. We've been able to have some good effect, but there is so much more to be done.

 

LEONARD HORATIO MCCOY. _Address_ San Francisco, CA. _Occupation_ Doctor, Director of the Orion Free Health Clinic. _Degrees_ MD, UCSF; PhD, Univ. of CA at Berkeley. _Partner_ James Kirk '63 _Children_ Joanna, b August 23, 1964.

Thanks to the damn custody laws in this country we couldn't say anything until last year, but yes, Jim and I are together, have been since he moved in, but probably were before that anyway. I can scarcely believe that my Jo is a sophomore in Winthrop House, and wants to follow her old dad into medicine. Couldn't be prouder.

Now that the dammed virus has been isolated—and I'm also proud to say that one of my former students was involved in that important work—I've decided to step down from my position at UCSF. With some seed money from The Orion Fund, of which I'm honored to be a board member, we've established a much-needed free clinic specializing in caring for gays and lesbians here in the city. Jim says that he's not surprised I found a way to be a country doctor in the middle of the city, but mostly I just like walking to work. And, like him, I like getting my hands dirty and seeing the change. There's a lot to do, and this crisis is going to get worse before it gets much better, but until the government realizes that it needs to get involved clinics like this one will be on the front lines, and I want to help any way I can.

 

MONTGOMERY SCOTT. _Address_ Palo Alto, CA. _Occupation_ Professor of Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering, Stanford University. _Degree_ PhD, California Institute of Technology. _Children_ Rosemary, b March 13, 1978.

Well, I admit that fatherhood came in an entirely unexpected, though not unwelcome and quite deliberate, manner. Rosemary lives with her mothers in San Diego but gets to see her old dad on a regular basis, and she's another child for Gaila to shower with attention. She already shows an interest in tinker toys, so I have hope for the future of women engineers.

Aside from teaching, I'm on the board of Gaila's foundation and that's been an eye-opening experience. Now our travels have a purpose, whether its overseeing the disbursement of funds or raising more funds among the generous friends we've made around the world. If you'd like to be a part, please write to us in care of The Orion Fund, San Francisco. Gaila and Jim are doing amazing things.

 

SPOCK. _Address_ Berkeley, CA. _Occupation_ Professor, Philosophy of Science and Logic, Univ. of CA. at Berkeley. _Degree_ PhD, Harvard University. _Wife_ Nyota Uhura '63, October 15, 1967. _Children_ Isaac and Rebeccah, b May 17, 1970.

By the time you read this, the bar and bat mitzvah season will be in full swing, with Isaac and Rebeccah at the center of it. Right now we are in the midst of planning for them, which Nyota is tackling with her usual brisk efficiency as well as a reprimand not to think I might get a book out of this. Not that I have any time to write when there are venues to visit, bands to audition (though Isaac is insisting on a deejay) and food to sample. I do not recall my own bar mitzvah being quite as much of a production, but my mother, who is here to help us, merely reminds me that I was not the most social of young teens. Fortunately the children take after their mother in that respect. Their present from us will be a family trip to Kenya to visit Nyota's extended family, whom we have not seen since our honeymoon trip.

In addition, Nyota and I have been very involved in the organization of The Orion Fund, run by our friends Gaila and Jim. It is yet another activity that makes me think about the responsibility that we all have to improve the planet as best we can.

 

* * *

**third book down**

 

_June, 1988_

"Wow, it even smells the same," Jim said.

"Of course it does," Bones replied. "We've had a teenage boy in our _house_ for the last four years. They all smell the same."

"Actually," Janice said, coming in the door after them, "both of these rooms had girls this year."

"Huh," Bones replied.

At least it _looked_ the same, good old Holworthy 13, and Jim felt sentimental as all hell. Not that he hadn't been in a room at Harvard since commencement—they'd moved in Joanna after all—but this was _their_ room. This was where it had all started.

"You just gonna stand there?" Bones asked. He had wandered off into one of the bedrooms and was poking irritably at the mattress on the bed. Christine and Jan were in the other bedroom, unpacking.

"Maybe," Jim said, but he walked into the bedroom with Bones. "Ooh, we've never done it in a Harvard bed."

"I don't know how much sex we're going to be having this week with Chris and Jan next door," Bones replied.

Jim grinned and wrapped an arm around Bones's waist. "I can be quiet," he said.

"Yeah, well, I don't know if the bed can," Bones said, scowling at it.

"At least they took out the bunk bed for us," Jim said. He leaned in a little closer. "Did you ever think about kissing me, when we shared this bedroom?"

"No," Bones said, quickly, but his face was flushing. "Maybe. Dammit, Jim!"

"What?" Jim said, innocently as he could, though he had turned them slightly so they faced each other, and put his other hand on Bones's chest. "I thought about kissing _you_."

Bones raised his eyebrows. "Well," he said, "you just gonna talk about it, or are you gonna do it?"

Jim shook his head. "You're a jackass," Jim said, and kissed him. Bones pulled him closer, deepening the kiss, and then Jim lost track of his surroundings.

They were interrupted by a tap on the door. Jim looked up and realized that somehow they'd ended up on the window seat, Jim in Bones's lap, and he hadn't thought the two of them would _fit_ on the window seat.

"Yeah?" Bones said, as usual completely unashamed at being caught, when he'd been blushing thinking about it beforehand. Jim found this to be inexplicable, but by now he was used to it.

Nyota was in the door. "Are you two just going to sit in here and have sex all week?" she asked. "Because you could have done that in San Francisco."

Gaila popped her head in as well. "Isn't the room great?" she asked.

"Thanks again, Gaila," Jim said, extricating himself from Bones's arms. "I don't know what strings you pulled to get us our old freshman room for the 25th, but this is amazing." The two walked back out into the common room, where the rest of their friends had gathered. Spock, Nyota, Gaila and Scotty were sharing the other room across the hall.

"I dunno, I think our Radcliffe room was nicer," Nyota said.

"It was," Gaila replied, perching on one of the desks, "and now the 35th Reunion ladies are in it. But these two rooms, a shared bath—perfect for the eight of us."

Scotty wandered in, a bag in one hand and a case in the other. "Ladies, gents, I suggest it's time for a cocktail."

"I wondered where you went," Gaila said.

"Market 'round the corner has cupfuls of ice," Scotty said, pulling one out of the plastic bag, "and Gaila won't have a whiskey without ice." He set that down on the desk next to her, then opened the case, which contained a bar kit complete with collapsable metal cups.

"Who would have thought, that first night we met," Christine said as they watched him set up, "that we'd all be back here, and all coupled up like one of those girls' books. Like Nancy Drew or Grace Harlowe."

"Not like them," Nyota said. "There weren't any black girls in Nancy Drew."

"Or Jews," Spock said.

"I'd say there weren't any lesbians," Janice said, "but I admit I'm having second thoughts about George."

"Oh, George. I had such a crush on her," Christine said. "That really should have been a sign, looking back."

"I dunno," Jim said. "I think you're both more like Bess."

Spock turned to Jim. "You read Nancy Drew?" he asked.

"Yeah, why?"

"Maybe _that_ should have been a sign," Bones said.

"What was I supposed to do?" Jim said. "I'd finished all the Hardy Boys that were in the town library."

"How funny, Scotty," Gaila said. "We're the most traditional couple here!"

"Yeah," Bones said. "You're living in sin, and he had a baby out of wedlock with your lesbian friend. Pretty _traditional_."

"All right, so none of us would have been in those books," Nyota said. "Maybe that's better, anyway."

"So what are you pouring us, Scotty?" Jim asked.

Scotty answered him by handing him the bottle, then continued to pass glasses around.

"A 30-year single-malt scotch," Bones read over his shoulder. "Well!"

"Aye," Scotty said. "It's about a year off but it'll do."

"A year off of what?" Janice asked.

"1959," Jim said, grinning. "Scotty, you sentimental thing."

Once they all had glasses Scotty raised his. "A toast, to the friendships formed one night in September, nearly thirty years ago, and a hope that we'll all be here twenty-five years from now to do it again."

"Cheers," they said, clinking glasses. They sipped quietly, all lost in their own memories, and Jim was glad to know he wasn't the only one feeling flooded by the past.

After a while, Spock cocked his head. "Do you hear that?" he asked.

Nyota looked out into the Yard. "It's the band," she said, grinning.

They threw their windows open, leaning out and seeing their classmates doing the same all over the Yard, and as the band started the old fight song they all sang along, waving their fists and cheering. Jim sat on the window seat, Bones holding his hand, and thought yes, the past was lovely, but the future was even better.

 

* * *

 

  


**Harvard Class of 1963**  
_Twenty-Fifth Anniversary Report_  


 

JAMES TIBERIUS KIRK. _Address_ San Francisco, CA. _Occupation_ Brig. Gen., USAF (Ret.); Director, The Orion Fund. _Partner_ Leonard McCoy '63. _Children_ David, b September 28, 1970.

1\. Four gentlemen—a pilot, a doctor, an engineer and a philosopher—walk into a bar.

 

LEONARD HORATIO MCCOY. _Address_ San Francisco, CA. _Occupation_ Doctor, Director of the Orion Free Health Clinic. _Degrees_ MD, UCSF; PhD, UC Berkeley. _Partner_ James Kirk '63. _Children_ Joanna, b August 23, 1964.

2\. They each ask the bartender for a whiskey.

 

MONTGOMERY SCOTT. _Address_ Palo Alto, CA. _Occupation_ Professor of Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering, Stanford University. _Degree_ PhD, California Institute of Technology. _Children_ Rosemary, b March 13, 1978.

3\. The gentlemen are joined by four lovely ladies—an artist, a doctor, a linguist, and a benefactor.

 

SPOCK. _Address_ Berkeley, CA. _Occupation_ Professor, Philosophy of Science and Logic, UC Berkeley. _Degree_ PhD, Harvard University. _Wife_ Nyota Uhura '63, October 15, 1967. _Children_ Isaac and Rebeccah, b May 17, 1970.

4\. And they all lived happily ever after. (Did you think this was a joke?)

**Author's Note:**

> Ridiculous pile of influences include: the statue of three lies; Chef Chow; WWII movies of the 50s such as _The Longest Day_; spring break senior year; Royal Wilder making pancakes in _The Long Winter_; the movie _Shag_; American International's Frankie and Annette beach movies; _Casablanca_, which was originally titled Everybody Comes to Rick's; Karl Urban wearing a pinky ring like DeForest Kelly in the movie; _The Thirty-Nine Steps_ with its spy plot and its music hall star The Amazing Mr. Memory; the guys in my class who wrote a long running story in our anniversary report; psychoanalytic theories about joke-telling; my college friend the heiress; the clunky renaming of Emerson Hall in _Love Story_; the defections of Valentin Poénaru, Vladimir Pasechnik and Vladimir Petrov; the research done at UCSF to isolate HIV; and the work of GMHC.


End file.
